Spirits Articles

“…a five story high Bourbon bottle,” the under-hyphenated press release read, and for a moment I thought it was an announcement of a new 750,000ml packaging innovation. Be a little hard to carry home, I thought, but it sure would save on trips to the liquor store. more >>

Well, Cognac, from the town of the same name. It’s called brandy, or eau de vie, when it’s out of town, but the best grape spirit in the world, by popular consensus, is cooked up in the fields surrounding Cognac in more or less concentric circles, starting with Grande Champagne and the Borderies in the bulls-eye with Petite Champagne, Fins Bois, Bon Bois and Bois Ordinaire circling it. more >>

Well, vodka, no pun intended. I’m older than vodka, so it’s never been on my preferred potable list. OK, I’m not actually older than vodka, but when I was first bellying up to assorted bars on the west side of Chicago, it wasn’t on most people’s lists and the vodkateers were marketing it as having "no taste, no smell," which struck me at the time as, well, dumb. more >>